


I Wasn't Doing Anything Stupid

by This_ape_writes



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: M/M, Minor Injuries, cursing, more cursing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-08
Updated: 2016-12-08
Packaged: 2018-09-07 06:23:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8787001
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/This_ape_writes/pseuds/This_ape_writes
Summary: Jim gets injured on an away mission but dang it, he wasn't doing anything stupid.





	

Once people get an idea about who you are in their heads, it's like that idea becomes tattooed into the very tissue of their brains and no matter what they want to think or no matter how much you really do change who you, are they are incapable of seeing it. 

This can be such a weird phenomenon and the thing about it is, it might not even be your actions that create the original image of who you are to begin with. It could be an older sibling or a parent who's actions have cemented who you should be before you're even born. 

 

That's probably something I've always known in my life on some level, since I've experienced it first hand for so many reasons but the first time it really consciously hit me was right after I'd turned fourteen. 

I had been a messy child. Too much energy and an overactive brain were a bad combination to instill order and cleanliness into. 

But three months of intense physical and emotional life and death trauma has a way of settling that out. 

And before you go all... you know...just stop. This isn't a story about...that, I'm, not ready to talk about that yet. But I need to bring it up because of this. 

When I came back home at fourteen, too many pounds too light and terrified of my own skin, I took control where I could. 

Part of that became making everything around me in perfect order. 

Ok.

So you could argue that was probably a red flag of other problems that weren't being addressed and my mom probably should have been alarmed at the change but she really did the best she could. 

No really. That's not an idle platitude. She really did the best that she possibly could in an impossible situation. If it hadn't been for her I wouldn't have recovered as much as I did. That was without a doubt when she and I were closest to each other and I am so glad she was there to take care of me. 

But when things had settled back into whatever normal life had become for us, she came into my room one morning on a Saturday to tell me her agenda for the day. 

To be fair, we were still trying to get used to each other and she hadn't been around me for a long time, but what struck me is this. 

She rushed in to tell me she was heading out and that I should get outside sometime because it was such a nice day. And then, standing in the middle of my perfectly precise, flawlessly clean carpet, in a room that was nearly empty, she added,

"But before you go, for the love of god Jimmy please pick up your room." 

I remember looking up from my book I was reading to start to ask her what on earth she meant when it hit me. 

She had cemented in her mind that I was always messy. 

She'd had years and years of that actually being true. That became for her who I was, so overpoweringly so that visual evidence couldn't even change it. 

Now she may have been distracted. She may have been a hundred different things but I sat there staring in the hallway as I watched her disappear, feeling my heartbeat speed up and get heavier with each expulsion of blood and I just felt really...lost. And as humans I think we always feel a little bit misunderstood by other people, especially if we're kinda awkward to begin with, but as I sat there in the quiet trying my best not to lose my shit and cry, I felt like absolutely nothing I could do in my life would ever override what people thought about me. 

'I'll believe it when I see it', is not how that saying should go. 'I'll see it when I believe it' is more in line with the truth. 

And because I'm stubborn and because I can't just let things be, most of my life has been me dramatically and loudly forcing people to see what I'm capable of. Which is unbelievably counter intuitive, when I also really don't want anyone to pay much attention to me. I'm an irritating contradiction I know. 

Believe me I know. 

And if strangers don't see me changing or growing or getting better that's one thing. It's annoying but I get over it fast. They don't really know me so who gives a shit. 

But when people closest to me do the same thing it...well it makes me question if maybe they're right. Maybe I'll always be the fuck up who can't do enough. Even if I know deep down that's not really quite true, and I have my own proven evidence against it, I guess even deeper down I'm terrified I'm wrong. 

Maybe I need to see it reflected from other people before I'll believe things too. 

So as I'm sitting in a chair in our overly crowded med bay having the skin of my hand knitted back together, Bones' off handed comment punches me deep in the chest. And like that, I'm fourteen again in the quiet, trying not to lose my shit and cry. 

Bones doesn't notice. He is definitely too distracted. He yanks off his gloves and throws them away with too much force and I flinch at the sound they make against the trash can. 

"Sit still for five minutes then we can do one more round," he grumbles. 

I nod. I know the drill. It takes me more rounds in smaller doses to heal my skin than the average person. We'd learned that the hard way in trial and error over the years that ranged from immediate large red blisters that made me feel like I was on fire to no healing whatsoever. But we'd had years of practice. 

Eight to be exact. 

And we are more intwined in each other's lives than anyone else I know. He knows me better than anyone. I'm pretty confident he loves me more than anyone too. 

Anyone. 

So this...this hurts. Not my hand, my hand's fine. My heart man. It fucking hurts. 

*I can't believe you still pull this idiotic shit with me. *

He thinks this is my fault for doing something stupid.   
He still sees me as reckless. 

And he's had years and years of that actually being true. 

But living through trauma isn't the only thing that changes a guy. Dying does a number on you too. 

It changed how I approach certain things anyway. Like how I treat my life, and the things that could possibly end it. 

Now look, I am never going to shy away from dangerous things if I can help save someone else's life. And I'm not going to sequester myself away behind a desk and never leave my ship, but my days of diving first and asking questions later are starting to be behind me. 

That isn't how I hurt my damn hand. 

Yes I had been down on a possibly hostile planet but I hadn't left the transport. I was there as a presence and nothing more. And when everything had gone badly and shots were actually fired I STILL didn't jump in the line of danger. 

I helped get everyone back inside, I made sure everyone had what they needed but I trusted my crew to do what they had been trained to. And when the last person was loaded inside, no one on either side had been killed, and I'd managed that from a place of safety. 

I'm really proud of that fact.

Now there were injuries. An almost unbelievable amount of injuries. I think that every single person on board had sustained an injury of some kind and the away team had consisted of seventeen people. Hell even I had been injured. 

But that's just the thing. My damn hand hadn't been due to anything dangerous other than a door with rough edges that probably just needed to be sanded down. I'd been pulling Ensign Vellet into the transport after she had tripped at the door and the weight of her falling had crushed my hand into that sharp edge and sliced it up nicely. 

It would heal. 

She would heal.

I know my feelings will even get over this, eventually, but right now in my five minutes of just sitting in my own head I'm kinda, sorta, stuck, feeling awful. 

*I can't believe you still pull this idiotic shit with me. *

He'd muttered it quietly with a frown of either anger or concentration or maybe a bit of both but I'd heard him. I can't stop hearing him. It's replaying again and again over and over in my head. 

And I'd actually flinched when he'd said it, too. 

It's the 'with me' part of that statement that's awful. 

Like I'm doing this just to hurt him. 

Like I have him in mind when I jump in to nonsense and jump anyway because I don't care. 

But I do care. 

And I'm trying. 

No, fuck that I'm not trying I'm DOING. 

And he can't see it.   
The one person I love most in this entire damn universe can't see that I'm changing and that I'm better. 

That I'm not the same idiot I was when he met me. 

He can't see me and that's more upsetting than I'd like. 

I should be keeping my blood pressure and heart rate level. The stupid device attached to my wrist will alert him if that changes too much. So I close my eyes and I take slow deep breaths in and out and I'm wishing the five minutes away as fast as they can move for me. 

I get my wish. 

I open my eyes and jump when I feel someone running their fingers across my hand and I actually let out a sigh of relief when it's not him who is tending to me anymore but Christine Chapel. 

"Sorry to startle you Captain. I'm just running the last round," she says as she turns on the regenerator and my hand starts to sting like it's been soaked in rubbing alcohol and bees. I clench my teeth and squeeze my eyes shut and try my best not to move. 

 

"I think he's a little bit angry," she says and I huff out a sound that I think started out in my throat as a laugh. 

"He's not the only one," I mutter and I'm shocked to find that's the truth. Turns out in my five minutes of solitude my injured feelings had flared into something more. It still hurts don't get me wrong but that depressed aching feeling of wanting to just cry has new edges to it that are also pretty angry. 

 

"Odd injury for a fire fight," she muses as she takes in the jagged pink skin on my hand. 

"I wasn't in a fire fight. I hit the edge of the transport door. The transport I never left," I grumble. She blinks up at me making quick eye contact before turning back to her task of repairing. 

"Oh. That explains the uneven edges of the cut. We should probably get that door fixed. Seems like a bit of a hazard," she says with a smile and I feel myself smiling back and I take a deep breath as I keep my hand steady. 

"I got a repair team on it already," I say. 

"Well...the good news is it didn't hit any nerves but my god that's a really deep cut. That explains why you're covered in your own blood." 

I glance down at the large red stain about the size of two of my hands laid side by side on the front and center of my gold command shirt. 

"I didn't exactly have anything to put on it to make it stop. The first aid kit we had was kinda being used for more important injuries," I admitted. 

"Well the good news is you didn't pass out and clothes can be washed." The regenerator clicks off and the stinging stops and I glance down to see almost no evidence of my injuries existence. "Good as new," she tells me with another gentle smile and I nod as I get to my feet. 

"Thank you," I say. 

"You too Captain," and I start to chuckle thinking she's said that as an automatic response that doesn't quite fit the situation but she continues. "I mean that. You made sure a lot of these people made it back here to us safely. You did good today." 

I nod at her. 

"Oh and I'll make sure he wraps things up here and actually leaves when he's finished over there. His shift was over an hour ago. It looks like we only have one more person to treat and no one is being admitted so that should be something I can force him to do. As much as he hates to admit it we can function just fine in his absence." I nod again and say thank you to her but my thanks really is an automatic response that doesn't quite fit the situation.

I need a tiny bit of space right now. Sending him home early isn't something I think I want. 

I weave through the few remaining patients still waiting to be discharged and make it one step into the hallway before I hear my name yelled behind me. I pause out of habit and dammit that gives him just the time he needs to weave after me and before I can properly brush him off he's barking out goodbyes to his staff and inspecting my hand as he pulls me completely outside with him. 

But before he can say anything directly to me I can't help it I glare at him and I mutter,

"I wasn't doing anything stupid. Alright?" 

 

He snorts and has the god damned nerve to roll his eyes at me. So I yank my hand away from him. 

"I wasn't. Aren't you still needed in there, Doctor?" 

Shit. Using his title in the tone I just did really isn't gonna make this better. He narrows his eyes. 

"As a matter of fact, Captain, I'm checking on a patient right now," he mutters grabbing my arm in a very unpleasant vice. "Office," he says and I let him pull me but this is already getting out of control. I wasn't that upset. He should have let me be but now he's pushing all the wrong sore spots with me and I'm furious. 

Once we're safely inside his office with the door locked behind us we both start talking at once. 

"The fuck Jim..."

"This is bull shit..."

"What's bull shit?" 

"I can't believe you're acting like this!"

"Me? You're the one getting angry for getting yourself hurt like an idiot again."

"No! I'm angry at you for not listening!" 

"To what?" he laughs. "Some god damned ridiculous excuse?" 

I take a deep breath. And then I take another one just to keep mildly sane as I stare at him from across the tiny room and try and remember not to punch his face in. But the second I think about actually doing that all my energy drains away. I don't want to hit him I don't even want to feel upset at him. 

"No. Forget it. Let's just...I don't even know," I say. I suddenly feel forty years older than I did this morning and like I haven't slept in a few weeks. And whatever anger was sharpening my feelings has completely deflated back into depressed defeat. "Never mind. Let's just...fucking go home." I take a few steps towards him and he grabs my arm to push me backwards and keeps me right where I was. 

"Hang on a second. What the hell is going on with you," he asks. I look up at his frowning face and then down at where his hand is wrapped around my bicep and I don't over think whatever it is I'm doing I just lean into him and throw my free arm around him in a hug. 

He lets out a short laugh that gives away his surprised confusion and then lets go of me so he can grab me in a bigger hug of his own as I drop my forehead against his shoulder and let all of my anger just leave me. 

"Jim..." he says like my name will give him answers but I don't know how to answer a question that isn't one. So I just shake my head at him and hug him even tighter. Maybe if I stand here long enough he'll forget we were even talking. But I know that won't really fix anything. 

So risking another flash of furious yelling I take a deep breath and lift my head. 

I make sure he's looking at me but I don't exactly let him go from my hug and when he starts shaking his head and opens his mouth to ask me again what's wrong with me I shut him up with a head shake of my own. 

"I wasn't doing anything stupid. But I don't know how I can make you believe that," I say. 

"Jim," he says again but I shake my head harder. 

"No. You're not hearing me. I wasn't unnecessarily reckless today. I haven't been in a long time. So please don't keep getting angry with me for things that are out of my control. Ok?" He stares at me with his mouth slightly open and a frown like I've asked him to solve an unsolvable riddle. He blinks and frowns a little bit harder and finally asks me, 

"What?" 

I let my eyes close for just a second and I take a deep soul weary breath. 

"Look. I was down in the transport today in case they really did want to negotiate. I needed to be the face of that conversation but I never went outside. Even when they started shooting at us unprovoked I didn't move, I let everyone else do their jobs. My damn hand just ran into a fucking rough spot on a door in need of repairs. It could have happened to anyone at anytime. I wasn't being stupid. I wasn't. And it hurt alright,". He glances at my hand and I sigh as I roll my eyes at him. "Not my hand what you said earlier. Like I somehow managed to get hurt just to piss you off. Well fuck you ok? I'm not the same ass hole I used to be. I just wish you could fucking see it." 

"Woah," he says as his frown gets deeper. "Hang on a second, I'm sorry but Jim all I see is the aftermath of your missions kid. I can't see that you're interactions are different." 

"Haven't you noticed that you've been treating me less and less over the last year or so?" 

"Well yeah but I thought you were just getting luckier somehow." 

"Thanks for the faith in me Bones. I appreciate it," I mutter and he grabs both my arms to spite the fact I've made no move at all to go anywhere. 

"Hey don't take this out on me!" he says. 

"I'm not, I just...shit man I've been consciously working on how I conduct myself in every god damned situation I've been in for a long time now but what's the fucking point if you're still gonna think I'm an irredeemable fuck up," I say. 

"Hang on just a damn second kid. I never thought you were a fuck up, god I love you I would never think that." 

"But every time anything goes wrong you immediately assume it's my fault." He opens his mouth but he can't disagree with that so I shake my head at him to make him stop. "Do you have any idea what it's like to go into a shitty situation that collapses out of your control in a way that usually ends in you getting really fucking hurt just to come back and be yelled at for being stupid by the one person you love more than anyone else in this world?" 

He sucks in a tiny breath and closes his mouth as he stares at me. And he finally shakes his head. 

"I don't," he says suddenly looking stricken like he's fucking injured me. 

"No. You don't know. And do you know what it's like to consciously make drastic efforts to make things go as smoothly as possible and to actually get some positive results just to come back and STILL get yelled at every single time?" 

"No," he says. 

"Look, it's fine. I'm sorry I got so angry. I'm just...can we go home now?" I ask but he shakes his head and holds tightly on to my arm. 

"No. Hang on a minute. That was a lot of information to get in a very short amount of time give me...just a second here." He frowns and shakes his head "Jim...I've been yelling at you like that for YEARS. If it was making you feel like dog shit, why the hell didn't you say anything?" 

He's got that 'good god man I've mortally wounded you' look on his face again and I don't like it at all. 

"No. Bones don't do that. Don't...look at first I kinda needed someone to kick my ass and make sure I wasn't being stupid." I dip my head a bit so I can keep eye contact with his eyes that seem to want to drop to ground in some kind of shame spiral. "For the record it worked," I say with a tiny smile that earns me a harder frown. 

"What the hell does that mean?" he asks. 

"You telling me over and over to be more careful it worked Bones. I changed. God I hear you in my head every single mission I go on. You inspired me to be better. But Bones. I am better," I say. 

"Ok. I'll believe you," he says. 

"Yeah?" I ask. 

"Yeah. Jim you have to tell me this stuff you can't just expect me to notice things I'm not around for. Or better yet, let me come with you." 

Now I'm frowning. 

"With me? On missions?" I ask not sure I'm hearing words right. I've begged him for years to join me in that kind of a thing. He hates that. Or he did...

Maybe I'm not the only one changing. 

"Why not," he says. His hand on my arm gives me a small encouraging squeeze and he gives me a lopsided smile. It looks out of place with the frown that's still firmly creasing his forehead, but I like that the smile is there. 

"Really?" I ask. 

"Well hell kid, if you're not just bullshitting me and you really are being more careful then why the hell shouldn't I go with you? I'm a senior officer. I've taken all the same diplomatic training you have. Plus I'm charming." I snort. "Shut it. I'm damn charming when I wanna be," he says. "But that way I can see you in action. Patch you up if shit goes sideways when it goes sideways and not after." 

"Bones I'd love that," I mutter as he rolls his eyes and drags me back into a hug. It's hesitant like he still expects me to be angry but god I'm really not. I hug him back tighter so he can get the idea that I'm fine and I hear him sigh deep from his chest. 

"I'm so sorry," he mutters. It comes out muddled since he's resting against his jaw with his entire weight of his head on mine and can't quite open up right to articulate words but I hear him anyway. I shake my head. 

"I know. Me too." 

"No not just for gettin' angry. I'm sorry for all of this. For yellin' at you for so long. For not noticin' stuff. For lettin' you do this alone. We're a team dammit. I should know better than that." 

"It's okay. Really it is. Stop feeling bad about it," I say. 

"If it were that easy..." he says. And I chuckle. "I'm glad you're alright." 

"Me too Bones," I add. 

"Let's fucking go home," he says. 

"Thank you. Finally that's what I've been saying!" I laugh. 

"See sometimes I listen," he says. I shut him up with a kiss and drag his bones home after me.


End file.
